


Hot Landing

by Santosha



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: 34th Street!Whump, AO3 1 Million, And you never live it down, Break Harlem one time, Do I warn for cursing?, Gen, Nonthreatening monster of the week, POV Outsider, Protective Hulk, Tony crashes sometimes, Where the heck is SHIELD, cursing, it's a thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-16
Updated: 2014-02-16
Packaged: 2018-01-12 15:41:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1190589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Santosha/pseuds/Santosha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A civilian EMT gets to meet the Avengers. Hawkeye is snarky. Captain America is dreamy. Iron Man has questionable self-preservation skills. She’s really hoping not to meet the big green guy.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Bruce’s teammates are giving him gray hair.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hot Landing

Julie was already on her way to the call before her boss called back with the useless, excited clarification that the injured person was an Avenger.

 This was good because she only had about seven minutes to get nervous and star struck before she was face to face with a pissed-off Hawkeye. Not putting weight on his right foot. Arguing with someone over his earpiece.

 "I know I'm a circus act, Cap, but I don't shoot with my feet... have Tony set me someplace... come on, don't..."

 He yanked the earpiece out before she could figure out how to get her patient's attention. "God dammit!"

 "Sorry? My name's Julie, I'm an EMT, they sent me over to take a look at your ankle. Do you want to sit down?" She offered her arm to support him.

 "You aren't SHIELD? Wow, this really happened fast if they aren't here yet. Lucky it's only me. I'm like the only Avenger whose body isn't full of classified data. Just don't ask how I got any of the scars or I'll have to kill you."

 Julie let him talk while she poked at his ankle. "Wiggle your toes? I don't think anything is broken. I'll wrap it for now, but you might want to get X-rayed. I can call an ambulance..."

 Hawkeye shook his head sadly. "SHIELD Medical and I are practically married at this point.  I wouldn't want to cheat on them."

 "Clint?" An out-of-breath stranger was hurrying up to them.

 "Hey," said Hawkeye. "I'm fine."

 "You went off coms before I heard how badly you were injured."

 "Oh! Sorry, lost my temper with Cap." Hawkeye looked down at his earpiece on the ground. "Julie, this is Bruce Banner, Bruce this is Julie, heroic civilian EMT, sorry I didn't get a last name. She reckons I probably just sprained my damn ankle."

 Julie swallowed, produced a polite nod, and focused on wrapping Hawkeye's ankle, trying to keep her expression neutral. The name had triggered a video collage in her head, containing all the news footage she'd ever seen of the Hulk. She signed on for this job to _help_ people, dammit, not to get smashed.

 She tried to keep one eye on Banner without being obvious. He seemed calm enough at the moment. He was sitting next to Hawkeye saying, "I didn't like being sidelined either, but Cap, Widow, and Iron Man seem to be more than a match for it. It sounds like they aren't having much trouble."

 After another minute or two, Banner reported that the monster thing was down, and a minute or two after that, _Captain America_ showed up and smiled at Julie, and she forgot to be afraid of the Hulk and forgot to act professional and pretty much forgot her own name until he turned his attention off her.

 She recovered her wits as Captain America was telling Banner and Hawkeye, "Tony's still in the air; the suit got damaged in the fight and they are trying to fix it before he lands. Widow's watching him, I'm going to get where I can see him too."

 He stepped away. Hawkeye looked from Cap's back to Julie's face with amusement. "Captain America strikes again."

 "He should come with a warning label," said Banner.

 Before Julie could figure out how to respond to the teasing, Captain America was was shouting orders at the police, "Clear the block! Get everyone out!" and Banner was suddenly serious.

 "Tony's on the com. The suit's as fixed as it's going to get and he says he's 'coming in hot.'" Banner made quotes with his fingers, looking skeptical about Iron Man's idea of what this might mean. Hawkeye scrambled for his neglected earpiece. 

 "Widow reports eyes on Iron Man, says he has steering but he's coming in fast," Banner continued.

 Then they could see him, tiny but growing too quickly, aiming carefully for the block they had cleared.  When he got close enough, he landed by the simple method of cutting most of the power and smashing a good-sized crater into the pavement. He bounced a few times, adding some lesser potholes in a neat row down the middle of the street, then skidded about half a block before coming to a halt.

Captain America and Bruce were sprinting out to him before the suit had stopped sliding.  Hawkeye looked at Julie with a forced smile. "I can hear him cursing over the com, so he's alive and conscious, anyway." 

Julie snatched up her first aid supplies and ran out towards the crash site, thinking about broken bones, maybe internal injuries. What kind of padding was inside the Iron Man suit?  There wasn't exactly room for air bags.  She was going to have to call for help, she didn't have the equipment for this.

 The suit helmet was open, and Iron Man was talking to Captain America. _Alert, oriented,_ Julie thought automatically.

 "I'm sure that was very dramatic looking, but I am a connoisseur of crashes and believe me I am totally fine, Jarvis is just being crazy-careful, Jarvis, let me out already!"

 A tinny voice from inside the helmet said, "Scans reveal no broken bones, Captain. Apparently I was able to control the descent enough to prevent any serious injuries. I'm releasing control of the suit now."

 "Awesome."  The suit opened itself, and Tony Stark crawled out, wincing.  "Though I'm not sure how much of this hunk of tin is repairable, may just end up salvaging parts for the next version, hey!"

 As he tried to stand up, Captain America and Banner each took an arm and sat him back down next to Julie.

 She started, "Hi, I'm..."

 Banner growled over her, " _No we don't need the Hulk on this one_ they said _it's under control_ they said. What part of that looked like 'under control' to you two?"

 Stark bristled.  "It is under control, do you see a giant plant monster walking around? No, because it's under control. The thing got in one lucky swipe that damaged my thrusters. No harm done, look, no broken bones, no bystanders hurt, and the only property damage was a few chunks of 34th street. Don't tell me you, Mr. I-Broke-Harlem, are going to give me shit about a few chunks of 34th Street."

 Julie tried to check if Stark had any injuries she was missing, while dodging his angry hand gestures. She wished he wasn't so casual about arguing with Banner. At least he could wait until she wasn't around.

 "Excuse us if we have some issues with watching you plummet out of the sky! I can't imagine why!" Banner snapped.

 "That was not a plummet! That was a hot landing! Survivable crash landings are a proud part of the Iron Man identity. All the way back to the Mark I. Come on, it's a _flying metal suit._ I wear it while people are shooting at me and monsters are trying to hit me. I crash sometimes. It's a thing."

 "You didn't want to fly back to the Tower?" Captain America sounded a bit calmer than the other two.

 "It was crash here or crash there, and it's more expensive to fix the workshop balcony than pay for a few potholes.  I do sometimes consider putting a giant trapeze net on top of the Tower for times like this. But I feel like the sight of it might undermine public confidence in Iron Man." Stark looked thoughtful, as if this were a serious dilemma.

 Banner sighed, surrendering.  "It's giving me gray hair being friends with you."

 "Rhodey says the same thing," Stark said, seemingly struck by the coincidence.

 Julie noticed that she had been holding her breath, and started breathing again. It looked like Hulk was not making an immediate appearance.  Through some engineering miracle Stark had nothing more than bruises.  She started packing up her kit.

 Banner said, "If you had told me how bad it was, if you'd given me a minute, I could have transformed and the other guy could have caught you."

 "He's right, Tony," Captain America said.  "You should have told us the situation and given us time to come up with the best plan. You're still acting like you don't have a team."

 Stark blinked a couple of times, and finally said, "I suppose I am."  In the next second, he had switched moods again, and was asking Banner, "Would that have worked? Would the other guy come out just to catch me and not do any smashing?"

 "Yes. He remembers catching you before. He watches out for falling teammates now."

 "Huh."

 Julie walked away from them quietly, thinking about the angry, scary Hulk watching out for falling Avengers who might need to be caught.  It didn't make sense, until she found herself thinking about her parents.  When she and her sister were kids, and did something dangerous and stupid, their mom and dad would get so angry at them. 

  _Being angry doesn't mean you don't love people_ , she thought.  _The Hulk is scary but maybe he also loves people and worries about them._

 She thought it might take a while for that idea to fit into her head. She still hoped that she didn’t ever meet the Hulk in person.

 She thought maybe she’d call her parents. They might be worried about her.


End file.
